C’s close to selling out of home games

The Celtics hope to become champions after acquiring Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen over the summer to play with Paul Pierce.

They’ve already become big winners at the box office.

For the first time since they left the old Boston Garden after the 1994-95 season, the Celtics are on the verge of selling out all of their 41 home games. Single-game tickets went on sale last Friday and Celtics president Rich Gotham said yesterday the team expects 26 games to be sold out by the end of this week, except for the 300 $10 tickets that will go on sale the day of each game. Gotham said he expects the remaining games to sell out as well. Less than 1,000 of the 18,624 tickets available — all in the lower priced categories of $20 to $70 — remain for any game. Most tickets remain for the final seven games in late March and April.

If you haven’t purchased Celtics tickets yet, your best bet to watch them in person might be their preseason game Oct. 19 at the DCU Center against New Jersey.

Season tickets sales sky-rocketed 40 percent after the acquisitions of Allen and Garnett and now account for 80 percent of all Celtics tickets. Sales could have soared even more, but the team stopped selling season tickets in order to make single-game tickets available to broaden their fan base.

Gotham said season ticket prices did not increase and only 15 percent of single-game ticket prices — mostly the lower priced ones — were raised.

The Celtics averaged 16,843 fans last year and sold out only nine games. Their highest average attendance was 18,132 with 28 sellouts for the 1997-98 season. The Celtics routinely sold out at home during the 1980s and early 1990s at the old Boston Garden, but that building seated only 14,890.

During an informal gathering with the media yesterday, Rivers repeatedly referred to Pierce, Garnett and Allen as “The Big Three.” Gotham, however, said the team is using “Think Big” instead of “The Big Three” in its marketing plan out of respect to the original Big Three of Larry Bird, Kevin McHale and Robert Parish.

The Celtics will open training camp with media day tomorrow afternoon at HealthPoint, their practice facility, but the team has been practicing together on its own for the past three weeks.

Celtics coach Doc Rivers said Ray Allen’s surgically repaired ankles are fully recovered, and he’s usually the first to arrive at practice. Allen has taken Rajon Rondo under his wing, including him in his shooting drills.

Tony Allen still hasn’t regained his explosive jumping ability following knee surgery. Rivers thinks it could be midseason or longer before Allen jumps as high as he once did.

While others are worried about his team’s inexperience and lack of depth at point guard, Rivers said he’s more concerned about the center position. Rivers said center Kendrick Perkins’ left foot is no longer bothered by the plantar fasciitis that slowed him last season, but it could flare up at any time. Perkins has lost weight to try to enter this season in better shape, but Rivers said he’s still not where the team wants him to be.

Rivers faces a far different challenge this season than a year ago when one of the youngest teams in the league finished with the second-worst record in franchise history.

“Instead of teaching guys how to play,” Rivers said, “you have to teach them how to play together.”

Rivers isn’t thrilled about having to switch Garnett from power forward to center if Perkins gets in foul trouble as he often does and injury-prone backup Scot Pollard gets hurt. Pollard played only 109 minutes — the equivalent of about 2-1/4 games — for Cleveland last season.

The Celtics will fly to Europe this weekend and play preseason games in Rome and London before returning to Boston on Oct. 11.